Legal reelism
Subtitle: movies as legal texts
By: edited by John Denvir.
Contributors: Denvir, John, 1942-
Publisher: University of Illinois Press
Published: 1996
Place of publication: Urbana
Language: eng
Number of pages: 314
Subjects: Justice, Administration of, in motion pictures; Motion pictures -- Moral and ethical aspects; Motion pictures -- Social aspects
Description: Law and justice are important themes in film, not only in courtroom dramas, but also in the western, the film noir, even the documentary. In the Godfather trilogy Francis Ford Coppola shows that the Mafia possesses its own strict codes, even though they are in conflict with those of the criminal justice system. In Woody Allen's Crimes and Misdemeanors the protagonist also "gets away with murder," but with a different dramatic intent by the director and a different effect on the audience.

Shedding light on myriad facets of the law/film relationship, fourteen contributors to Legal Reelism analyze films ranging from The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, It's a Wonderful Life, and Drums along the Mohawk to Do the Right Thing, Basic Instinct, The Thin Blue Line, and Thelma and Louise.

The first volume to contain work by both humanists and legal specialists, Legal Reelism is a landmark text for those concerned with depictions of justice in the media and the impact of those depictions on society at large.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references and index.
Table of contents: title: Myth and meaning : Francis Ford Coppola and popular response to the Godfather trilogy / David Ray Papke; title: Print the legend : violence and recognition in the man who shot Liberty Valence / Cheyney Ryan; title: Through the great Depression on horseback : legal themes in Western films of the 1930s / Francis M. Nevins; title: Framed / Richard K. Sherwin; title: The laws of the game : Jean Renoir, La Regle du jeu / Tom Conley; title: Capra's constitution / John Denvir; title: Popular culture/popular justice / Anthony Chase; title: Morality and liberal legal culture : Woody Allen's crimes and misdemeanors / Judith Grant; title: Rewriting history with lightning : race, myth, and Hollywood in the legal Pantheon / Margaret Russell; title: Celluloid sovereignty : Hollywood's "history" of native Americans / Terry Wilson; title: Pubic execution / Andrew J. Mckenna; title: Class action : one view of gender and law in popular culture / Mark Tushnet; title: Outlaw women / Elizabeth Spelman and Martha Minow; title: Law noir / Norman Rosenberg.